Series: Like Us Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 241
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
Charlie is pulling me away from the window. What? No! They’re still talking.
I try to step back, but he yanks me harder and my knee scrapes one of the prickers. Ouch. To avoid a full leg of scratches, I slip to the side and follow his lead.
He’s hiking up the hill towards the house. My breath is heavy, and Charlie is silent.
“You heard all that, right?” I ask him, wondering if I’m stuck in a dream-state. Any second now, I’ll wake up in bed.
He’s already pulling out his phone. Ignoring my question.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
Again, he says nothing.
But my phone pings, and I realize he sent a text. I’m a part of many different cousin group chats, so I can’t be sure who he just messaged. Not until I read the name of the group chat.
A-SQUAD + LUNA
This…this chat must’ve been created in the time I’m missing. I scroll through the contacts listed beneath the chat name. Jane, Maximoff, Sullivan, Beckett, Charlie.
The A-Squad are the five oldest of our families.
Charlie
Attic. Now.
19
LUNA HALE
I’m not sure I’ve ever personally braced the musty depths of this attic. Holiday decor is located in the daylight basement’s storage closet. A well-traveled location for all.
Whereas the attic looks like it was left behind in another era entirely. It’s a spacious relic of discolored cardboard boxes, worn and yellowed furniture from the 2010s, old baby cribs, broken tricycles, and hidden junk.
Dust blankets every floorboard, except for the new footprints veering in multiple directions. The six of us are astronauts and we took our first steps on the moon.
I like to think I’m sitting on moondust and not just dirt and dust bunnies. I’m sprawled out on the hardwood, the only one choosing the floor as a seat.
Charlie rests his weight against an ornately carved wardrobe. He’s not very alarmed considering the bomb we just dropped on Beckett, Sulli, Moffy, and Jane. I can’t really point fingers since I’ve contemplated making moondust angels.
But this is serious.
I can see that in how my older brother hasn’t taken a seat. He stands upright like an untouched, never-played-with Captain America action figure. “Were they ever planning on telling us about the will?” Moffy asks me and Charlie.
Charlie looks to me, waiting for me to respond to my brother.
He’s been doing that. Shuffling the storytelling to me, even though he called this meeting. I kinda like just being the voyeur to the A-Squad. It’s not like I remember being included in this group to this degree.
“Uh,” I say. “That’s a matter of perception, I guess. We didn’t hear a definitive answer.”
“And what is your perception?” Jane asks me from a rickety rocking chair. It creaks as she sits forward in curiosity, her fingers beneath her chin. She is somehow both feminine grace and clumsiness, a unique amalgamation.
“If we give it time, I think they’d tell us,” I say.
“They were still debating it,” Charlie says. “I didn’t care to wait for them to decide either way.”
Sulli sneezes into her palms.
“Bless you,” Beckett tells her. They’re sitting together on a squishy plaid couch.
“Thank you, fuck—” Another sneeze. Then a third.
Beckett takes out a deep blue pocket square from his tailored black suit jacket. I’m guessing he didn’t cry at the funeral since he gives Sulli the unused silk cloth.
She wipes her nose. “There’s no fucking way my dad would want me or my sister to take over Fizzle.”
“It doesn’t matter what they want,” Charlie says.
Beckett asks, “And what if no one wants it?”
“It doesn’t matter what we want either.” He threads his arms loosely. “Our parents are going to sit in a room with lawyers and comb through our grandfather’s will and see the cost of not obeying his final wish. They won’t pressure us to be the lifeline, but there is pressure because this isn’t just up to them. The board will see the consequences, and the people in those chairs will make sure a successor from the second generation is named.”
Goose bumps pimple my arms, and I want to blame the draft as temperatures drop outside and the sun lowers.
Jane’s eyes dart to Moffy. “History is repeating itself, old chap.”
Moffy’s brows knit together. “When my dad was forced to compete for CEO of Hale Co.—he said winning was losing. They all wanted it because it was the only way to ensure the people they loved wouldn’t be stuck in that position. I bet they’re worried we’ll all do the same.”
“Oui,” Jane agrees.
“They didn’t name any of you,” I chime in.
Charlie cocks his head at me, possibly wondering why I would divulge this piece of information. But I’m wondering why he chose these four out of everyone to text. They’re not even in contention!
“What do you mean?” Beckett asks, then looks to his twin brother.
Charlie speaks to me in a made-up language. That I made. It’s the ancient language of the blood court on the planet Demos in the Thebulan saga. It shocks me at first, especially that he even knows how to pronounce the words like I intended.